Image manipulation applications are often used to combine content from multiple images. For example, FIG. 1 depicts an example of blending foreground images with background images. In this example, a blending workflow 104a, which could include various actions performed with an image manipulation application by an artist, combines semantic content from a foreground image 102 and a background image 106 and thereby generates a blended image 108. In this example, an image manipulation application could implement the blending workflow 104a by receiving various user inputs from an artist that select a particular portion of the background image (e.g., the grass and sky in the center of the image) and align the selected image portion with a desirable portion of the foreground image 102 (e.g., the woman depicted in the center of the image). The image manipulation application blends the image content together based on these manual inputs. But this blending workflow 104a is often time-consuming and subject to user errors with respect to filtering, positioning, and masking the foreground image 102 and a background image 106.
Certain existing solutions could partially automate this image blending workflow. For example, an image manipulation application could execute one or more action scripts that implement a series of commands that would otherwise be performed manually within a user interface of the image manipulation applications. But these action scripts are often limited to photometric adjustment actions (e.g., changes in contrast, brightness, etc.), and do not automatically adjust the positions of the images to be blended or adapt to image characteristics.
These deficiencies could result in sub-standard blending outputs. For instance, in the blending workflow 104b, a failure to properly align relevant portions of a foreground image 110 and a background image 112 results in an aesthetically undesirable blended image 114. The blended image 114 fails to preserve relevant semantic content from 110 by, for example, blocking most of the upper half of the depicted woman. Furthermore, the blended image 114 includes a sharp change in color scheme halfway through the image that does not enhance the aesthetic quality of the blended image 114.
Therefore, existing solutions for blending images present disadvantages such as (but not limited to) those described above.